Not But a Number
by Ellen Lily
Summary: Six sisters one with a name and five without. Sisters 2 through 6 are all just numbers. They aren't really people, they have no individuality,and limited brains. At least we think, but maybe not. Is Six not but a number, or is she more...?
1. Chapter 1

AN: I looked and saw that the character list for Wicked included Two, Three, Four, Five, and Six, but when I clicked on it, there were no stories for it. My imagination took it from there, hope you enjoy. P.S I don't own Wicked.

Prologue

A girl watched the strange green woman walk up the staircase to her room in the tower at Kiamo Ko . Auntie Witch, known as Elphaba by Nanny, hadn't even noticed her when she walked right past her. Of course no one noticing her was normal for her. The only time someone noticed her was when she was with her sisters and even then they didn't notice _her_ they noticed the group. She was only one sixth of a person. She had five sisters Sarima and sisters two through five. She was Six. Not a person, not an individual, a number among other numbers. She barley remembered her parents, but she knew they had never been particularly interested in any of their children after their first little "princess." They had named Sarima and pampered her. When their second daughter had been born they named her Maricata, however her parents had been too absorbed with Sarima to actually care about Maricata. Never being able to actually remember her name they had simply referred to her as Two. They hadn't even made an effort with their next child, they named her Carletta formally, but never called her anything but Three. Four wasn't sure what her name was and Six wasn't sure if Five had one or not. She just knew that by the time she was born her parents put nothing but Six upon her birth certificate. She knew, she had read it. Surprise, surprise, she had _read_ it. Only Sarima, Two, and Three had ever been taught to read at all by Sarima's deceased husband Fiyero. At the time he was alive, Six had only been, well, six. However she had taught herself to read by listening to the lessons. She had been much more interested than any of her sisters and had learned enough to get herself started. She had started swiping one book at a time from the bookshelves that everyone thought went unused. She had read every one of them, well except one. She had opened it once only to see a bunch of characters she had never seen before. When the words had seemed to swirl upon the page she had slammed it shut in fear. But other than that every book had been read cover to cover including the three different dictionaries.

She sighed listening to the male footsteps coming from below. They were soldiers from the Emerald City, a town she had never seen and never expected to see. All of her sisters were trying to get their attention, but Six was trying to keep to the background. Her sisters were all aging and quite badly at that but they all seem to forget that she wasn't. She liked it that way. If any of her sisters thought she could possibly be attractive she would be forced into a marriage and, though she didn't practically like her life, she preferred the little freedoms she had. So she hid any potential she had as best she could. She walked over to the old dusty mirror and wiped off the reflective part. She was twenty-two, her long curly brown hair was dirty and hadn't seen a brush in a long time, but it could be shinny and beautiful if she washed it. If she pulled the hair back she could see her face. She had pale blue eyes that seemed almost iridescent and high cheekbones that were the perfect rosy color without pinching them as her sisters did. She stood up strait and pulled the dress, which hung on her loosely, back wrapping it around her fist in order to see her figure. It was a normal twenty-two year old's figure and was quite attractive towards men, judging by the rather interesting pictures she and found stuffed in the back of a book.

She heard someone walking down the hall and quickly let the dress fall, hunching her shoulders, and pulling her hair into her face. Sarima was walking down the hallway. "Hello, sister," Six spoke.

Sarima started not noticing her until she spoke then smiled. "Hello Six, what are you doing up here?"

"Just taking a walk."

"Ah," she looked at the door leading to the flight of stairs Auntie Witch had just taken. "I wonder why Auntie Witch so despises the soldiers." Sarima wasn't truly talking to her but more using her as a wall that she won't look crazy talking to. Six meant nothing to Sarima.

"I don't know," Six replied even though she did. Auntie Witch may be somewhat nasty at times and tended to not be very sociable, but she was intelligent. Now Six didn't know much about the outside world, except for what she had learned it the books, but she wasn't dense. The men meant them harm in some way or another, but her sisters didn't see it that way. They were too ignorant and lonely to actually use the brains they supposedly had to realize that the men were likely going to slit all of their throats by the end of it.

"Hm," Sarima moved on without even a goodbye.

"If you don't start using your brain it will rot," Six sang quietly at her sister back before turning back to glance in the mirror. She turned away from her reflection and went down the steps back to sisters two through five. Little did she know that at that moment events were being set in motion that would change her life forever. For at that moment a witch was flying out the window.


	2. Chapter 2

AN: I don't own Wicked, but I hope you like what I've done with it.

Chapter One

Six was on edge, but she wasn't completely sure why. Something had changed in the past few hours, and none of her sister seemed to notice. The soldiers were doing something, whispering among their ranks. She didn't like it; she didn't trust them, especially their Commander. Commander Cherrystone could be considered a handsome man, she assumed, but something about him made her squirm whenever he was near. There was a certain coolness in his eyes that told her he would do anything if he was commanded to by his Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Six had the sinking feeling that when that command came something bad would happen at Kamio Ko. Her sister and the children, including the Lirr boy, were in the kitchen when Commander Cherrystone and a few other soldiers entered. Sarima smiled at him in welcome and Lirr pattered over to him like the puppy he acted like whenever the soldier was near. Six however stiffened, the hair on the back of her neck standing up at the expression on the man's face. "Hello Sarima," he said a strange glint in his eyes

"Commander," her sister tried to purr in greeting. Even Six, with her limited knowledge of men, could tell that her attempt to flirt fell short, by a long shot. She glanced around at her other sisters. Their chests were thrust out until their backs arched at strange angles and Three looked as though she had dust in her eyes. Five tried, and failed, to flip her hair and Two, well, Six wasn't exactly sure what she was doing, but it made her look like a cross between an owl and one of Auntie Witch's flying monkeys. Six leaned against the wall, drew her hair across her face, and closed her eyes to block out the desperate and almost comical picture her sisters painted. She did her best to try to fade into the wall like one of the chameleons she had read about in a book called "Exploring the Land of Oz". Although Six didn't really need to try hard; she was already skilled at being invisible. In fact, she couldn't even remember a time when she hadn't been unseen. Maybe she hadn't been the day she'd been born. Maybe her parents had looked at her and actually saw their daughter as a daughter for the first few moments of her life. Of course, if that were true wouldn't they have bothered to give her a name? No, her parents had never noticed her or loved her in any way shape or form. All of their attention had been directed solely at Sarima. Why had they even decided to have more kids after their precious? Six had thought this multiple times over the years, but could never find an answer, and she would never be able to ask them because of their death only years after her birth. She was pulled from her thoughts as the air shifted; she opened her eyes.

"W-what?" Sarima asked Commander Cherrystone.

In a chillingly formal voice the Commander spoke. "We have been ordered to take you and your family as political captives of the Wonderful Wizard of Oz." It happened almost too fast to follow. Cherrystone seized Sarima by the bicep and the other men came forward to ensnare sisters two through five who all had yet to catch up with the situation, but Six had. When a stocky, balding man, who she had heard being called by the name of Carolton, came forward to grab her, she kicked him in the stomach, making him stumble back a few steps.

"What the fuck?" he exclaimed, surprised by the force of the kick and the fact that she had enough guts to deliver it and went to grab her again. She punched him in the face as hard as she could and was pleasantly surprised when she heard the satisfying crunch bone. She had broken his nose. "You little bitch!" he roared and she dodged him as he once again lunged at her and darted for the door. The other men after a moment of stunned confusion realized what was happening and one was quickly in front of her, grabbing, but she ducked under his arms only to be confronted with another. This one was huge and was blocking the entire door with his sizable body. She back pedaled and immediately crashed into another male body. His arms snapped around her waist and he lifted her off the floor. Profanities that she had never heard spoken and only knew from her books spilled from her lips as she kicked out at the other men grabbing for her. The scuffle lasted only about half a minute, due to the fact that it was twenty against one (her sisters just stood there stupefied) and she was five time weaker than them. She ended up in a position with both arms pinned behind her back and her neck being constricted by a man's hand until the world started to fade at the edges. At a nod from Commander Cherrystone the man holding her released her neck and she slumped taking in deep breaths. She heard his footsteps and then his military boots came into view.

"And what do we have here?" Cherrystone asked perplexed. He'd never expected any of them to act as she just had; especially not the one who had never spoke a word and stayed in the background most of the time. He'd been under the impression that she was dense and stayed quiet because of an empty head. Those thoughts had fled at the shouted curses and the calculated struggle. He jerked her head up by the chin so he could see her clearly and harshly whipped her knotted hair from her face. His eyes studied her impassibly. He tilted his head with a small sinister smile and chucked her under the chin. "You're actually quite pretty," he commented genuinely surprised.

"And you're actually quite a bastard, although I already guessed that!" She reinforced her cutting words by spitting in his face. Calmly he wiped the saliva off of his cheek.

"Get them all ready for the journey," he said to his men and then regarded her apathetically, "keep this one separate."

Six had the strangest feeling as suddenly she had been noticed alone, not with her sisters. She wasn't a number among numbers any more, but someone who was to be separate, a number all her own. Though she was frightened, as she should be, there was also a strange thrill about it. Yes, she was still just a number; she was still just six, but now she wasn't only one sixth.


End file.
